Change Shape (Su)

A hound archon can assume any canine form of Small to Large size, as if using beast shape II. While in canine form, the hound archon loses its bite, slam, and greatsword attacks, but gains the bite attack of the form it chooses. For the purposes of this ability, canines include any dog-like or wolf-like creature of the animal type.

Lore

Characters with ranks in Knowledge (the planes) can learn more about hound archons. When a character makes a successful skill check, the following lore is revealed, including the information from lower DCs.

Knowledge (the Planes)

DC Result

14 This powerfully built, dog-headed humanoid is a hound archon, a celestial being with a pure heart and a protective nature. This result reveals all outsider and archon traits.

19 As well as its aura of menace and a selection of spell-like abilities, a hound archon can also take on the shape of any dog-like or wolf-like animal.

24 Some hound archons can grow to a great size, and these creatures are a much more powerful foe, whilst other hound archons gain experience in character classes, with many who do so taking naturally to the role of the paladin.

Hound archons look like well-muscled humans with canine heads typically resembling those of noble-looking wolves or dogs. Well trained, they prefer to make use of their greatswords in battle, though they are equally adept with their natural weapons. Hound archons loathe killing mortals and prefer to disarm or incapacitate even evil individuals when they can. Against fiends and the irredeemably corrupt, though, they show no mercy.

Hound archons are disciplined soldiers and sentinels. Occasionally good-aligned deities send them to watch over specific places and individuals they take a particular interest in. Under the guise of unassuming but friendly strays, such secret defenders might follow their ward or guard their post subtly for years.

In Heaven's armies, exceptional hound archon paladins lead their fellows into combat, taking on roles as captains and knights. They lead incursions against fiendish holdings, whether that entails strikes against daemonic fortresses or liberating the captives of night hag soul collectors. Such missions make hound archons perhaps the most likely celestials one might encounter upon the Lower Planes, and packs of swift-moving wolves occasionally reveal themselves to be welcome saviors to those lost within such realms. Regardless of their orders, hound archons universally exhibit a particular hatred of canine fiends, abandoning all mercy and going out of their way to put an end to the evils of barghests, glabrezus, yeth hounds, and similar depraved outsiders.